Think about the rhythm genre for Virtual Reality. There is movement, there can be sweat, but there is one thing this genre has in common is exercise. The ability to move and position yourself in order to keep going for that high score or target those calories. It’s something that I quite enjoy because it works extremely well in VR. But does Developer Odders bring the fun, fitness, and rhythm into an experience we should play? Let’s find out with OhShape for PCVR and PlayStation VR.
OhShape is a rhythm game where you will dodge obstacles, make fun poses, and punching walls all with a unique way of moving your whole body. And before you know you are working out, feeling it out, and sweating it out to the music and rhythm that heads your way.
So before you really begin, make sure you have the room, because you do not want to hit your arms, hands, body, or controllers into walls or doors (depending on how you have your space set up). Trust me it’s not fun to start off in the center of your area only to get lost in VR and when you start another song don’t realize you are off-center only to move to the side and bump into the wall. So if your space is set up and your controllers charged, do yourself a favor and start with the tutorial. This way you get the basics of dodging and body movement and you want to be at the best when you are trying to climb those leaderboards.
As you can probably tell so far, you will need to be ducking from the walls that come at you from above, moving side to side and dodge the orange solid walls, and adjust your limbs of your arms as you have the cutouts on the walls that come towards you as well as punching walls and trying to grab the jewel looking objects all without having your health bar go down to zero all with the rythm of the music.
But it’s not just enough to think you will make it, but if you notice there is a shadow of you showing how you are in real time so that you can get ready for the next cut out or wall to dodge that may come your way. This actually is an awesome feature to have and saved me many times except on the harder difficulties, cause I wasn’t actually ready for those, but regardless it was fun.
When I first started out, I went with the easy just to get a handle on things And I will say that even on the harder difficulties, everything felt smooth and no loss of tracking which is always a plus. After each song, you get to see how well you did against others. I like how on these leaderboards it shows you where the other players are from, shows the headset, and the song you just completed with the score. But towards the bottom it gives you that option to play at a harder level almost saying “yes, you did this on easy and are better than this”.
The music tracks are pretty good with different albums and 31 songs with a variety that I am sure someone will find something to move along to. From Kpop to dance along with other genres to get familiar with in the difficulty of their choosing such as beginner, easy, medium, and hard. There are also modifiers that you can adjust the accuracy and speed which if you let someone who has never played a rhythm game in VR, it can be quite amusing to watch. But if you would like the option to loop the songs or start at any point in the song, the options are there for you. Also, there is a party mode if you have others who you want to compete against using the same headset you are using.
But there is a difference between the PCVR and PlayStation VR versions that I want to point out and that is custom songs. In the PCVR version, you can add any songs you would like so it really just keeps on giving. But there is also the OhShape Songs Editor on PCVR where you can create your own levels using the songs you want and then share them with the whole OhShape Community. This is a feature that I hope gets added to the PlayStation VR version as being able to load up your songs on the thumb drive and create your own levels and then share the would be a blast for many players, but I understand the limitations that might be in place.
If there is anything I would love to see added is just more music added with some music packs. Yes, on the PCVR you can add your own songs, but if music packs would be added and different arenas were themed based on the music packs or have the music video of that song be the arena. It’s just an idea that could be pretty aweosme.
Overall OhShape is fun to play, a great variety of music and even more when you can add your own to the mix, leaderboards to try and climb for each song and difficulty, and the ability to get fit all while having some fun doing it. When there is a pandemic and you really can’t get out due to health or by choice, isn’t it better to have an option today and every day in life to take some time and get ourselves into better shape?
OhShape is out now for the Oculus Rift/S and Oculus Quest/2 on the Oculus Store, PlayStation VR, Steam, and Viveport. A review code was provided.
To learn more about OhShape, please visit the site, like them on Facebook, follow them on Twitter, follow them on Instagram, and subscribe to their YouTube channel.
To learn more about Odders, please visit their site.
In case you missed the trailer, please enjoy. Until next time, I have some people to pass on those leaderboards.
